Aurora Cannabis Inc. (NASDAQ:ACB) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Miguel Martin: Yes, I think it’s a great question because it’s — there’s so much a point of interest right now, which is runway use of cash, what’s the right amount of cash. I think, first and foremost, people should look at company’s actions, maybe more so than even what they say and we’ve been very, very conservative in our balance sheet. Right from the beginning, when I got became CEO, the company really worked extremely hard to have a strong balance sheet. And we saw a lot of this disruption and clearly understand what using the ATM means and what that means to others when you look at it. But first and foremost, we believe that it was important for external stakeholders to see the company to have enough cash to be able to run the business, and obviously, that goes into how much cash you’re burning.

So we worked extremely hard and we’ve seen progression from at one point the company had over $100 million a quarter in SG&A, now to below 30 sort of beating the drum about our cost savings. But overall, it is my belief that the company has to have a certain amount of cash, maybe more so the normal to give people the comfort that we will be here for this inevitable upside for global cannabis. I mean, I think there’s no question that at some point, you’re going to see a significant amount of profitability opportunities around the globe, we believe in medical first, and the question is, who’s going to be there, and we think we’re going to be there. So the use of the ATM is used strategically. I think people have seen we’ve been good stewards of the cash, we’ve sold assets quickly and good prices.

We’ve taken converts down in many cases below par. And, Michael, I think we’ll continue to do three things. First, is always focus on having a strong balance sheet, so that we will have the wherewithal to be there when these opportunities hit as well as be there when potential M&A and other things happen, such as Bevo, which we thought was a great play. Secondly, we will be very judicious in our use of cash. And hopefully people have seen that here. And third, where possible, we will use it to find margin accretive and profit opportunities. And we were really thrilled this quarter, if you look at sort of cash use and where it went, that in each of our four key businesses we saw growth. And so I think you put that all together, and you can sort of see that the future will look very similar to how we’ve used cash in the past.

Operator: And the next question comes from the line of Andrew Carter with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.

Andrew Carter: Hey, thanks. Good afternoon. So I guess what I wanted to know is do you think you can achieve like strip out Canadian adult use? Do you think you can be positive EBITDA in that business considering kind of the difficult market? And just kind of a separate question, kind of how you, Miguel and the Board are looking at the business? Like I’ve got right now, yes, $274 million of enterprise value? Do you think that captures what the summer parts potentially is on the medical business, Canada Medical annuity? Bevo, what you can do there? And then also just the genetics investment difficult to value within the markets? And is that a consideration and something to keep in mind that potentially is a floor to consider here. Thanks.